A representative of Israel's Atomic Energy Commission held several meetings with an Iranian official to discuss nuclear issues in the region, the commission's spokeswoman said on Thursday.

The spokeswoman declined to give details of the meetings, but the Haaretz daily said the officials discussed the chances of declaring the Middle East a nuclear-free zone.

"There were several meetings between a representative of our commission and an Iranian official in a regional context," spokeswoman Yael Doron told AFP.

"These meetings were held behind closed doors," she said, adding that they were organised by Australia.

She declined to give further details of the talks, the first between the two archfoes to be officially disclosed since the shah of Iran was deposed in 1979.

The newspaper said Meirav Zafary-Odiz, director of policy and arms control for the Israeli nuclear agency, and Ali Asghar Soltanieh, Iran's delegate to the International Atomic Energy Agency, met several times in Cairo at the end of September.

Israel, the sole if undeclared nuclear-armed state in the Middle East, has never ruled out a resort to military action to stop Iran's nuclear drive which the West suspects is aimed at making nuclear weapons but Tehran insists is only for peaceful ends.